THIS WEEK'S CONTENTS

#MYAEOLIAN 2022 CAMPAIGN

Our Annual FUNdraising Campaign: Help us RECOVER and GROW as we move through COVID-19

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#MYAEOLIAN CAMPAIGN

For 138 years, The Aeolian has been a focal point of community and the arts. Stories abound. As we move forward to create new stories, we want to capture your stories. What is your Aeolian?

Send us your Aeolian story and help us showcase the role The Aeolian plays in our community. Your stories will help us celebrate the past and gain support to catalyze our future together!

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Tell your story in 2 minutes or less.

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We will do the rest!

Enjoy our 2022 highlights video, celebrating the friends, family, artists and volunteers that have made Aeolian feel like home this year.

We hope that you will tell us about your Aeolian experiences. You can share your story with us in writing, with a photo or by sending a short video. We would love to share it with others.

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PRODUCTION NEWS

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SELLING FAST: UPCOMING FEATURE PRODUCTIONS

TICKETS & MORE INFORMATION

Click on any poster to be taken to the ticketing page for the artist's bio, seat availability and to purchase tickets. For more information about the artist or to see video content, visit our website at www.aeolianhall.ca/events.

EL SISTEMA AEOLIAN UPDATE: HOLIDAY CONCERT AT EL SISTEMA

El Sistema Aeolian presented a fantastic Holiday concert on Thursday December 15^th at our Aeolian Education Campus. The concert featured many holiday classics from a wide array of ensembles, from Beginner Strings, Intermediate Cellos, and Ionian Orchestra to our Dorian and Phrygian Orchestras, various Brass and Woodwind ensembles, our very own teacher String Quartet, and our Glee and Full Choirs. The evening ended off with a lively orchestration of Irving Berlin’s Happy Holiday Merry Mambo orchestrated and conducted by Bruce Hoadley. In a fun gesture, Bruce invited some audience members to join and play bells with the orchestra for an encore performance of the mambo. It was truly a warm and festive evening. Congratulations to our students and teachers for their dedication and hard work. A big thank you to our volunteers who assisted with the concert and food. We continue our holiday performances on Saturday December 17^th at Mount Hope Centre for Long Term Care.

This past week we have also been running our sheet music sale of thousands of scores for all instruments. Many community members have come through to find a vast amount of scores of many well-known but also less well-known scores and composers.
 

CHRISTIAN SINDING

CHANSON OP 34, NO 5

Clark Bryan, Pianist. Recorded 2022.

ALBERTO GINASTERA

TRIBUTE TO JUAN JOSÉ CASTRO

Clark Bryan, Pianist. Recorded 2022.

SAMUEL MAYKAPAR

TOCCATINA OP 8, NO 1

Clark Bryan, Pianist. Recorded 2022.

“Music has the power to make us feel whole, to console, to reckon, to unite and has even started revolutions. Music brings us into the moment and reminds us that at the core of our soul is a creative spark. That creativity is really the act of living.”

- S. Clark Bryan

Opera, traditional music and carols mark borough’s bond with Ukraine

The borough's bond with the people of Ukraine was marked by arias, traditional music and dance in a fabulous recital at St Mary's Church.

The borough's Ukrainian Social Club, in association with Discover Twickenham BID, presented an evening of classical music and dance.

The concert featured Maryana Bodnar, soloist at the National Operetta of Ukraine, who brought a magnificent blend of British and Ukrainian Christmas favourites, accompanied by pianist chamber music partner Evgenia Startseva.

She was joined by Richmond's own Cantanti Camerati chamber choir, bringing the splendour and majesty of English music.

And there were several other Ukrainian performers, including Bandurist Duo 'Dvi Doli', and the Ukrainian folk dance ensemble 'Stefania'.

The borough has played a crucial role in supporting the people of Ukraine through The Prosperity Café in Twickenham, which has been the hub of a massive relief effort, sending tens of thousands of pounds worth of vital clothing and equipment to the war-torn country.

Volunteer, Cathy Cooper, said: "We spent Xmas in the company of Ukraine's finest with opera arias, traditional music, dance, mulled wine and mince pies. And then snow as we left St Mary's Church. A truly gorgeous evening."

- SOURCE: TEDDINGTON.NUB.NEWS

CELEBRATING PEOPLE FROM LONDON

This Week...

Gene Lockhart

YOU CAN'T HURRY LOVE

THE SUPREMES

1966

ST. LOUIS BLUES

BESSIE SMITH

1929

BRING IT ON HOME TO ME

SAM COOKE

1962

Meet the First Nations students who scored an interview with actor Ryan Reynolds

While Ryan Reynolds might not impress Shania Twain, he sure impressed students at Dennis Franklin Cromarty High School Wednesday when they interviewed him.

The high-profile interview stemmed from a collaboration between the school's media class and CBC Thunder Bay, where CBC journalists come to the school once a week. Students are taught about the inner workings of the media industry and create their own story ideas.

Student Chief Derek Monias, from Sandy Lake First Nation, helmed the interview, speaking with Reynolds for more than 30 minutes over Zoom.

"[I'm] starstruck, emotional, amazed. So many different emotions. I'm so happy right now," Monias said right after the interview finished.

"At first I was so nervous because we're meeting a big celebrity. But then eventually ... he felt like a friend," Monias said. "It felt like it was just us in that moment."

Reynolds, who logged in from New York City, told Monias he agreed to do the interview because, for him, it was a small effort, but for Monias, it could help his career.

"For me, it's, what is it, 30 minutes of chatting with a young, upstart journalist who I hope will one day be kind to me when you're in the big leagues," Reynolds said.

"You land an interview with me, now you'll go after someone else and be able to say, 'well, Ryan did it.'"

The school serves students from remote fly-in First Nations in northwestern Ontario, who travel to Thunder Bay to study each year.

Greg Chomut teaches the media class at Dennis Franklin Cromarty and said the idea to get Reynolds as a potential interviewee snowballed when the crew started thinking about people they wanted to interview.

"And it came to Ryan Reynolds. None of us really thought it was going to happen, but Derek really wanted to make the pitch to Ryan Reynolds, and we were encouraging [students] to kind of get crazy with it. And we sent out a tweet and … he responded right away."

With a response from Reynolds, the media club got started right away on working up questions, figuring out the logistics for the interview, and ensuring everyone had a role when the time came.

"There was a role for everybody, big and small. The quieter, more shy students were helping the elders and greeting people at the door and holding up signs for Derek. And some of the more confident outspoken ones had roles that fit that. So it was a really cool experience," said Chomut.

Jolene Banning is a journalist from Fort William First Nation and is an instructor with the club, alongside CBC Thunder Bay's Mary-Jean Cormier.

Banning said she is beyond happy for the students and everything they've accomplished during the media club, especially making the goal and achieving it.

"There was a few times, during the interview, where I really thought I was going to tear up because I was just so proud of everything that Derek had accomplished and the way he was handling the interview. It just, it made me feel so proud," Banning said.

With the media club, it's important for all the students to know there are different roles that people play and that everyone has a place regardless if they're shy or more outspoken, Banning said.

Banning said she became involved with helping the media club because she wanted students to know they have a voice and show them how they can use it for stories, and how these skills can help them in the world.

"The other important part for me was just letting these students know that we really believe in them, that we really support their dreams and that we really want them to succeed and be cheerleaders for them the whole way," said Banning.

Monias and Reynolds spoke on a range of topics from Deadpool, the contribution Reynolds makes to First Nation communities across Canada, and Shania Twain's name drop in her famous song That Don't Impress Me Much during a December performance.

Monias also asked Reynolds if he would be interested in coming to Wake the Giant, the annual music festival welcoming students to Thunder Bay each September. To the delight of the student audience, he said it's something he'd like to do if he can make it.

After the interview was finished, Monias and the team congratulated each other and Monias said he was impressed that Reynolds was interested in the questions, and he loved that Reynolds is learning about First Nations culture.

"It seemed like he took just the time out of his day, his busy schedule, just to talk to us. And we all crafted questions," Monias said, "And I noticed a lot of my original questions were in there. And I'm so glad that we liked them. And I'm so glad that we had a big, nice, big class to help us."

- SOURCE: CBC.CA

Queer creator blends Shakespeare with iconic music of Pat Benatar

For millions of GenX-ers, the music of Pat Benatar and Neil Giraldo – Benatar’s longtime lead guitarist, collaborator, and producing partner, and her husband since 1982 – has been an iconic generational touchstone for more than four decades. This might be especially true for queer GenXers, who found inspiration during their formative years in the defiant spirit that resonated through many of the duo’s songs.

One of those queer GenXers was Bradley Bredeweg, the out co-creator of another queer touchstone, television’s “The Fosters,” which became a hit for five seasons on FreeForm with its story of a lesbian couple raising five adopted children. Now, Bredeweg – a self-described “theater kid” – is helping to bring Benatar and Giraldo’s music to a new generation of rebellious youth with “Invincible,” a new musical that intricately weaves the couple’s legendary catalogue with inspired new songs to re-imagine Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet” for the 21st century.

“When I got into writing for television, I realized that I missed the equal exchange that happens between the people on the stage and the audience,” explains Bredeweg, who spoke with the Blade ahead of his show’s Nov. 22 opening at Beverly Hills’ Wallis Center for the Performing Arts. “I love film and television, obviously, I’m so grateful for it, but after a couple of years of doing it, I was like, ‘I miss that inner theater child, so I’m gonna moonlight.’”

The result of his “moonlighting” turns Shakespeare’s classic Verona setting into a modern, war-torn metropolis, and places his timeless tale of star-crossed lovers in a time of great transformation. Love and equality are forced to battle for survival as a newly elected chancellor works to return the city to its traditional roots and destroy a progressive resistance that is trying to imagine peace in a divided world – and if you think that sounds familiar, it’s by design. Its current run at the Wallis is its world premiere, but if things go as hoped, this is just the first step toward Broadway.

According to Bredeweg, however, it’s far from the beginning of his show’s journey.

“About 12 years ago, I realized I hadn’t read ‘Romeo and Juliet’ since high school and decided to read it again,” he tells us. “The next day I had to take a road trip – this was back in the era when I still had a CD book in my car – and I came across the “Best of” album of Pat Benatar and Neil Giraldo, so I popped it in and started driving. And because the story was obviously fresh in my head, I was listening to all these songs and realizing that if you line them up a certain way they totally tell the tale of ‘Romeo and Juliet.’ I wrote a first draft a couple of weeks later and then I just put it away and forgot about it.”

Much later, in 2015, he walked into a Los Feliz bar called the Rockwell (“It was this really cool kind of spot that we don’t have a lot of in LA, because we’re not a theatrical town”), where cabaret performances were sometimes mounted by visiting Broadway talent and Jeff Goldblum would do a gig every Wednesday night. Inspired by the vibe, he suddenly remembered, “this thing I had come up with all those years ago” and impulsively pitched the idea of putting it on to the bar’s manager. I said, ‘I’ve got this crazy idea where I want to combine Shakespeare with Pat Benatar,’ and she said, ‘That’s insane, but I’m a huge fan of your show and I love it, so let’s do it.’”

This early incarnation (then called “Love is a Battlefield”) was an unprecedented hit, enjoying a six-month run to sold out houses – that is, until Benatar and Giraldo’s manager attended a performance and recorded a video of the whole thing on his iPhone. He showed it to Benatar and Giraldo, and they were intrigued; but at the time, unbeknownst to Bredeweg, they were working on developing their own life story as a musical using their songs, so they sent a “cease and desist” letter to the Rockwell and the show was forced to shut down.

“It was heartbreaking, for all of us,” says Bredeweg, “because we knew we had something with real potential.”

Then, a year later, he got a call from a producer who told him Benatar and Giraldo wanted him to come to New York and discuss his musical.

“Of course, I said yes and got myself there immediately. We took a meeting on their tour bus, and we started talking about the musical they were developing, and suddenly we all started to move in the direction of doing ‘Love is a Battlefield.’ By the end of it we were all laughing about how we had started out with a ‘cease and desist’ order and here we were talking about coming together to do a show.”

In part, says Bredeweg, the couple was convinced to change course by their discussion of the proliferation of so-called “jukebox musicals” that have increasingly populated Broadway in recent years.

“We talked about how they have a shelf life, especially if they’re focused on a specific artist. They have a built-in audience, but beyond that, how can they stand the test of time? The real test of a timeless musical is if, in 40 years, every high school is doing it. I think that’s why we went back to using their iconic music to reinvent this epic, timeless tale.”

Another part of the appeal was how aptly the couple’s songs fit into Shakespeare’s classic – a coincidence, perhaps, but one that might be better described as synchronicity.

“When Pat and Neil met back in the late ‘70s it was supposed to just be a working relationship, but they fell head over heels in love with each other,” Bredeweg says. “When I got close to them, they told me they had been called the ‘Romeo and Juliet of the music world’ because the labels and managers and PR people were trying to break them up. They wanted Pat to stand on their own and Neil to just be her producing partner, and so much of what the two of them were creating at that time was about that struggle, about fighting that music industry system and saying, ‘let us figure this out for ourselves.’ That’s why so much of their music works inside of this story.”

For Bredeweg, the chance to realize his vision struck an intensely personal chord, too.

“I was always obsessed with the classics, but as a gay kid growing up in the ‘80s, I knew I felt different from everyone else, and as much as I loved them, I couldn’t really ‘attach’ to any character inside them. Nothing felt familiar to me, everything was from the point of view of a white cisgender person – and I always had these dreams, if I ever had any say, that I would love to tackle these classics in a different way and reposition them for a more diverse audience.”

In keeping with this mission, “Invincible” doesn’t just make Verona into a more modern city, but a more diverse one as well. The Capulet and Montague houses are run by the women, whose husbands are both dead; Romeo’s chum Benvolio is nonbinary, and falls in love with Juliet’s nurse; Juliet’s cousin Tybalt is secretly in love with her would-be husband, Paris; Paris himself is the city’s new chancellor, seeking the marriage as a means to control the vast Capulet fortune and deploy it to shore up his political power. In Bredeweg’s updated take on the tale, it’s a story about powerful men with powerful motives, with a matriarchy fighting against the traditional patriarchy and a younger generation trying to take control of its own destiny – and to ensure that it includes the freedom to love who they want.

“That’s obviously something the queer community can really understand,” says Bredweg. “We’ve been there and done that, the fight for marriage equality is all about that. It’s very much at the center of the show, and it was a big reason why I wanted to tackle the story, why I’ve rewritten so many characters with queer identities – taking these figures we thought we knew and giving them a more modern point of view.”

“Our culture is shifting in such huge ways,” he continues. “It goes back to my experience of not being able to find myself in these old tales. We are looking at our past, and pieces of art or the written world, or things in our politics, and we’re trying to reinvent these pinnacle moments in a way to make sure that history doesn’t always repeat, to move forward in different directions that are better for all of us. Especially the younger generations – they’ve stepped into this world where they’ve had no say in how chaotic things feel, and they are trying to take control of their identities and their path forward. That’s really what’s at the heart of our show.”

“Invincible” is not, of course, the first time “Romeo and Juliet” has been deconstructed and rebuilt as a musical; apart from the obvious example of “West Side Story,” the recent London import “& Juliet,” now a hot ticket on Broadway, presents an alternative version of the story in which the title character doesn’t kill herself, set to the music of pop songwriter Max Martin – responsible for hits from Britney Spears, the Backstreet Boys, NSYNC, and Céline Dion, among others.

Bredeweg isn’t worried about the competition.

“I never think about that kind of thing,” he tells us. “There’s always room for interpretation with classics of this stature. There’s space for both.”

His production, of course, has the added advantage of showcasing the music of two deeply beloved icons whose recent induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame has catapulted their names back into the public arena in a big way – not that they were ever very far out of it.

For Bredeweg, though, the Benatar/Giraldo connection has always been much more than just a way to make his show marketable. It’s the whole reason “Invincible” even exists.

“Pat captured my heart as a young gay kid for obvious reasons. There was something about her music, and her energy and messaging.

“It made me feel that if someone as powerful as her could exist, then I could, too.”

- SOURCE: WASHINGTONBLADE.COM

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